Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member opposite for her continued advocacy on the environment.

We understand that we need to rebuild trust in our environmental assessment system, that we need to make sure that the environment and the economy go together. That is why we are working extraordinarily hard with provinces, with indigenous peoples, with civil society, with business to ensure that we have a world-class environmental assessment system that protects the environment, supports reconciliation, and ensures that good projects go ahead in a timely way with regulatory certainty.

Mr. Speaker, it has been said that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, but this is not always the case for the name of a riding.

I am proud to rise on behalf of my constituents to introduce a private member's bill to change my riding's name from “Châteauguay—Lacolle” to “Châteauguay—Les Jardins-de-Napierville”.

The reasons why are clear. The municipality of Lacolle is in the neighbouring riding of Saint-Jean. Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle is in my riding. This causes confusion for consituents on both sides, and I thank my colleague and riding neighbour, the hon. member for Saint-Jean, for being here to support my bill today.

We are very proud that the name would include Les Jardins-de-Naperville, which is known for being the leading region in Quebec for vegetable growers and for key players in the agrifood industry.

I call on all members of the House to support my bill, because with the urban aspect of our riding well represented by the name “Châteauguay” and the rural aspect represented by the name “Les Jardins-de-Napierville”, the name “Châteauguay—Les Jardins-de-Napierville” sounds very sweet indeed.

Kevin LamoureuxLiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons

Mr. Speaker, we have had discussions among the parties, and if you seek it, I think you will find unanimous consent for the following motion. I move:

That, nothwithstanding and Standing Order or usual practice of the House, Bill C-60, An Act to correct certain anomalies, inconsistencies and errors and to deal with other matters of a non-controversial and uncomplicated nature in the Statutes of Canada and to repeal certain Acts and provisions that have expired, lapsed or otherwise ceased to have effect, be deemed read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole, deemed considered in Committee of the Whole, deemed reported without amendment, deemed concurred in at the report stage, and deemed read a third time and passed.

The first is from petitioners who once again are calling for the House to take action to ensure that cruelty against animals is curtailed.

We know, as many law enforcement officials will tell us, that cruelty to animals is a warning sign of criminal activity that will later take place affecting human beings and, for the rights of animals themselves, it offends our sensibilities.

The petitioners call for animal cruelty crimes to be taken from the property section of the Criminal Code and for the legislation to be strengthened.

Mr. Speaker, the second petition deals with the ongoing persecution of practitioners of Falun Dafa and Falun Gong within the People's Republic of China.

The petitioners call for the Government of Canada to take measures to protect practitioners and to put pressure on the People's Republic of China to respect the practitioners of peaceful practices of Falun Dafa and Falun Gong.

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to raise today. The first is petition e-766, which is from about 1,300 of my constituents in Victoria. It calls upon the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food to outright ban battery cages, enriched cages, and all other cages from Canada's egg industry, making it illegal to confine a chicken in any cage, of any size, for any period of time. The petition calls for the transition to be far shorter than the 2036 timeline proposed by the Egg Farmers of Canada.

Mr. Speaker, the second petition raises a very important issue, not just from members of my riding of Victoria but for all Canadians. I want to begin by commending the Victoria Raging Grannies and the Vancouver Island Peace and Disarmament Network for collecting signatures on their petition, which calls for Canada's participation in, and ratification of, the United Nations treaty to abolish nuclear weapons. These constituents call upon Parliament to take a position independent of NATO and the United States and support the treaty to prohibit the development, production, transfer, stationing, and use of nuclear weapons.

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to present two petitions. The first petition relates to impaired driving causing death. Families for Justice is a group of Canadians who have lost a loved one to impaired driving. They believe that Canada's impaired driving laws, and Bill C-46, the legislation that is being debated in this House today, are much too lenient. They want the crime to be called what it is, vehicular homicide, and believe in mandatory sentencing. They also believe that the minimum fine of $1,000 if a driver kills someone while driving impaired is totally insufficient, and are calling upon Parliament to change that. They oppose Bill C-46.

Mr. Speaker, the second petition relates to the conscience protection of physicians, which is being ignored in provinces like Ontario, where physicians are being forced to perform practices that are against their conscience.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to present a petition on behalf of close to 600 Canadians who are speaking out against the political violence and instability in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The petitioners are calling on the Government of Canada to exert diplomatic pressure on the DRC to put a stop to human rights violations and ensure free, fair, and transparent elections.

Mr. Speaker, once again I rise in this House, bringing voices from coastal British Columbia, who are calling upon the Minister of Transport to cancel the plans for five bulk freighter anchorages off Gabriola Island. The anchorages will be in lengths of up to 300 metres long, allowing the export of American products across the Pacific Ocean, which is of no community benefit.

The petitioners note that the scouring of the seabed by anchors and the risk of oil spills will threaten herring and needlefish spawning beds, and will have a potential impact on Gabriola Island's tourism and fishing charters. They list a number of devastating impacts this could have on our community, with no benefit of jobs at all, and urge the Minister of Transport to withdraw the application.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to table two petitions. The first is petition e-1067, signed by over 600 Canadians. It calls for the government to raise awareness around the need to better address psychological violence in the workplace. Psychological hazards exist in the workplace, and they must be substantially addressed. I am pleased to be able to support and present this petition, and the actions of those who are trying to make Canadian workplaces safer for everyone.

Mr. Speaker, the second petition I want to table is petition e-1116, signed by over 1,500 Canadians. The petitioners are requesting improved access for Canadians to documents that have been published by their government. The petition seeks to improve the openness and transparency of our democracy by improving access to government information.

Mr. Speaker, in the short amount of time I still have available, I simply want to repeat where I started, which was the fact that in Canada impaired driving was the leading cause of criminal deaths. We have one of the worst impaired driving records in the developed world. It is not surprising that the bill attempts to address the scourge of impaired driving.

We heard from Mothers Against Drunk Driving and other countless witnesses at the justice committee, telling their heartbreaking stories of the loss they had suffered. However, the bill poses serious concerns, particularly in the area of mandatory alcohol screen. There are also problems with the bill, which time will not allow me to address, with respect to minimum sentencing provisions, something which the government said it opposed, yet brought it up again in the bill.

What is the concern with mandatory alcohol testing? The new police powers enacted through the legislation would remove the reasonable suspicion requirements for roadside inspection by peace officers that presently exist in the Criminal Code, instead moving to a mandatory system by which, at the discretion of the patrolling officer, motorists must submit to random breath samples without any justification whatsoever, in other words, on a whim.

The leader of the NDP, Mr. Jagmeet Singh, told the Toronto Star that he had been pulled over 11 times because of the way he looked. He said:

I've been stopped by police multiple times for no other reason than the colour of my skin. “It makes you feel like you don't belong, like there's something wrong with you for just being you.”

That is why he has worked so hard to address racial carding and the like in the province of Ontario.

Vancouver lawyer Ms. Kyla Lee from Acumen Law testified to the committee as follows:

As a Métis I am very concerned about how this is going to affect people from the aboriginal community. We see in B.C. already basically an offence of driving while native, and that's only going to get worse.

We have grave concerns about the bill, as do many witnesses, including the Canadian Civil Liberties Association that brought its concerns to the committee. It said:

Since some individuals will often be pulled over “randomly” five, ten, a dozen times in a few months, for no obvious reason other than their age, the colour of their skin, or the neighbourhood they were driving in, RBT will often be humiliating and degrading to individuals who are subject to search.

Despite bringing forward many amendments, the NDP managed to get at least one that will make a difference. We commend it to the House and hope it gets enacted in the final bill. As well, we succeeded in getting the proposed section 31.1 added to the bill. It states that the government must table a report in Parliament within three years after these controversial sections come into force, and that the Attorney General, “must undertake a comprehensive review of the implementation and operation of the provisions at question”.

This is a complicated bill. We will take the time over the next while to consult and ensure that the balance that has been struck has been struck properly for all Canadians.